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animusrox · 10 months ago

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TOP 10

Past Lives

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

How to Blow Up a Pipeline

Poor Things

Oppenheimer

Barbie

BlackBerry

The Holdovers

The Iron Claw

Killers of the Flower Moon

MY LETTERBOXD Grade A 11. The Killer 12. Beau Is Afraid 13. Dream Scenario 14. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 15. Godzilla Minus One 16. American Fiction 17. They Cloned Tyrone 18. Evil Dead Rise 19. Eileen 20. The Artifice Girl 21. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem 22. Talk to Me 23. Reality 24. Leave the World Behind 25. A Thousand and One 26. Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One 27. Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. 28. Theater Camp 29. Carmen 30. Merry Little Batman 31. Priscilla 32. Society of the Snow 33. Infinity Pool 34. Enys Men 35. Sanctuary 36. Rye Lane 37. Skinamarink 38. Monster 39. Anatomy of a Fall 40. Landscape with Invisible Hand 41. Reptile 42. Sisu 43. Pinball: The Man Who Saved the Game 44. No One Will Save You 45. Tetris 46. May December 47. The Zone of Interest 48. V/H/S/85 49. Dumb Money 50. El Conde 51. Arnold 52. Maestro 53. Napoleon 54. 20 Days in Mariupol 55. Influencer 56. The Creator 57. Origin 58. Thanksgiving 59. Next Goal Wins 60. The Boy and the Heron 61. Bottoms 62. Wonka

[Press Keep Reading For The Full Graded List]

Grade B

63. God Is a Bullet 64. No Hard Feelings 65. Joy Ride 66. Fair Play 67. Cocaine Bear 68. NYAD 69. Asteroid City 70. Nowhere 71. The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster 72. Divinity 73. The Equalizer 3 74. The Last Voyage of the Demeter 75. Venus 76. Butcher’s Crossing 77. Somewhere in Queens 78. The Persian Version 79. Boston Strangler 80. Polite Society 81. Miguel Wants to Fight 82. The Color Purple 83. The Royal Hotel 84. Saw X 85. All of Us Strangers 86. Fallen Leaves 87. Ferrari 88. Elemental 89. Peter Pan & Wendy 90. Renfield 91. Cat Person 92. Scream VI 93. The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes 94. BS High 95. Blue Beetle 96. Huesera: The Bone Woman 97. When Evil Lurks 98. Dark Harvest 99. A Good Person 100. Final Cut 101. Knock at the Cabin 102. Quiz Lady 103. Leo 104. Air 105. The Super Mario Bros. Movie 106. Batman: The Doom That Came to Gotham 107. John Wick: Chapter 4 108. Beaten to Death 109. The Wrath of Becky 110. Passages 111. Transformers: Rise of the Beasts 112. Gran Turismo 113. 65 114. Sick 115. Sister Death 116. The Blackening 117. Please Don’t Destroy: The Treasure of Foggy Mountain 118. Flamin’ Hot 119. Nimona 120. Cobweb 121. Totally Killer 122. What’s Love Got to Do with It? 123. Sharper 124. Unseen 125. Dunki 126. Bird Box Barcelona 127. The Marvels 128. Shazam! Fury of the Gods

Grade C

129. Wildflower 130. Freelance 131. M3GAN 132. Strays 133. Sympathy for the Devil 134. Creed III 135. Chevalier 136. The Marsh King’s Daughter 137. A Haunting in Venice 138. The Little Mermaid 139. Silent Night 140. Master Gardener 141. The Flash 142. Fast X 143. The Pope’s Exorcist 144. Saltburn 145. Kandahar 146. Stand 147. Plane 148. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny 149. Fingernails 150. Quicksand 151. Fool’s Paradise 152. Migration 153. Rustin 154. The Covenant 155. Good Burger 2 156. The Pod Generation 157. Alice, Darling 158. Insidious: The Red Door 159. Missing 160. Shotgun Wedding 161. You Hurt My Feelings 162. The Boogeyman 163. Showing Up 164. Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom 165. Champions 166. Consecration 167. The Nun II 168. Biosphere 169. House Party 170. The Exorcist: Believer 171. Big George Foreman 172. Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves 173. Children of the Corn 174. The Beanie Bubble 175. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania

Grade F

176. Anyone But You 177. Marlowe 178. Paint 179. Extraction 2 180. It Lives Inside 181. Deliver Us 182. Trolls Band Together 183. Finestkind 184. Corner Office 185. Wish 186. Prisoner’s Daughter 187. Pain Hustlers 188. Foe 189. The Mother 190. Old Dads 191. Ghosted 192. Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken 193. Haunted Mansion 194. Mafia Mamma 195. Five Nights at Freddy’s 196. The Machine 197. Justice League: Warworld 198. We Have a Ghost 199. What Comes Around 200. Legion of Super-Heroes 201. The Boys in the Boat 202. Attachment 203. Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre 204. About My Father 205. You People 206. Meg 2: The Trench 207. Pathaan 208. Rebel Moon - Part One: A Child of Fire 209. Assassin 210. Dalíland 211. Vacation Friends 2

Bottom 10

212. Sound of Freedom 213. Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey 214. When You Finish Saving The World 215. Heart of Stone 216. Family Switch 217. Expend4bles 218. Sweetwater 219. Hypnotic 220. 80 for Brady 221. Spinning Gold

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whateverisbeautiful · 7 months ago

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Reveling in Richonne - Master List

TWD Season 8 - Season 11 & Richonne Top 30

Season 8

#100: The Treasure (8.01)

#101: The Happy Place (8.01)

#102: The Alarm (8.03-8.07)

#103: The Heart (8.08)

#104: The Peace (8.09)

#105: The Shock (8.09)

#106: The Bond (8.09)

#107: The Brother (8.09)

#108: The Best Friend (8.09)

#109: The Determination (8.09)

#110: The Future (8.09)

#111: The Aftermath (8.10)

#112: The Preservation (8.10)

#113: The Lost (8.10)

#114: The Focus (8.10)

#115: The Voices (8.10)

#116: The Steadying (8.12)

117: The “He Will” (8.12)

#118: The Golden Rule (8.12)

119: The Commitment (8.13)

120: The Staying (8.14)

121: The Turn (8.14)

122: The I Love You’s (8.14)

123: The Messenger (8.15)

124: The Found (8.16)

125: The Living (8.16)

126: The Saving Grace (8.16)

Season 9

#127: The Art (9.01)

#128: The Duo (9.01)

#129: The Famous (9.01)

#130: The Lucky Ones (9.01)

#131: The United Front (9.02)

#132: The Light (9.03)

#133: The Perfection (9.03)

#134: The Thank You (9.03)

#135: The Family Fun Day (9.03)

#136: The Right One (9.03)

#137: The Night & Day (9.04)

#138: The Presence (9.04)

#139: The Stand (9.04)

#140: The Ditch (9.04)

#141: The Courage (9.05)

#142: The Heart & Wisdom (9.05)

#143: The True Love (9.05)

#144: The Close (9.05)

#145: The “Still Here” (9.06)

#146: The Boss (9.06)

#147: The Royal Baby (9.06)

#148: The Defender (9.07-9.12)

#149: The Search (9.14)

#150: The Little Ones (9.14)

#151: The Shoulder To Lean On (9.14)

#152: The Intensity (9.14)

#153: The Chosen (9.14)

#154: The People We Love (9.14)

#155: The Fair (9.15)

#156: The Reward (9.16)

Season 10

#158: The Brave (10.01)

#159: The Insight (10A)

#160: The That Walk (10.04)

#161: The Unison (10.04)

#162: The Ocean (10.08)

#163: The Sailing Off (10.08)

#164: The Set Up (10.13)

#165: The Set Back (10.13)

#166: The Trip (10.13)

#167: “What If I Hadn’t Saved Her?” (10.13)

#168: What If They Didn’t Save Me? (10.13)

#169: “What If They Needed To Be Saved From Me?” (10.13)

#170: The Takedown (10.13)

#171: The Discovery (10.13)

#172: The “Believe A Little Longer” (10.13)

#173: The Little Brave Man (10.13)

#174: The Cherished (10.13)

#175: The “Who Are You?” (10.13)

#176: The Next Chapter (10.13)

Season 11

#177: The Unstoppable Life (11.24)

#178: The Ones Who Live (11.24)

Richonne Top 30

Top 30 List Links & Poll Results

#richonne #reveling in richonne #list & links #s8 - s11 #richonne fandom #richonne family #michonne grimes #rick grimes #rick x michonne

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pumpkin-spice-whump · 8 months ago

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Okay I got a little more confident. Here's the first chapter.

This is a while after Jack had first been kidnapped and sold. This is the first chapter of the book, the other one was a flashback. (Sorry that's confusing. It'll make more sense with the whole thing)

Jack bangs his head against the wall. 106. He lazily lifts his neck and drops it again. 107. He decided he was on his way to beat his all time high of 318 a while ago. He only stopped then because he blacked out for a second, and he figured that repeatedly smashing his head into the wall wasn’t the smartest.

Except who the hell cares what the smartest thing to do is when you’re bored out of your mind.

108.

Not ‘oh there’s nothing on TV’ bored. Bored like Jack only has eight books in his cell anyway, and never mind the fact that he’s already read them all so much he’s got them memorized, but also the light has been flickering and if it goes out then he’ll be in darkness for months on end so he might as well just sit in darkness now by choice. So that’s what Jack did. He took a nap. Again. And then sat in darkness and banged the back of his head against the wall because that was better than letting his mind wander.

109.

Jack can never let his mind wander. When it does he always ends up sobbing so hard he throws up, or plots how he can potentially end his own life.

110.

If he lets his mind wander he might think of his mom. He might think that she’s forty eight now, and he missed another Christmas with her. He’ll think about how terrified he was when he was grabbed and thrown into a van. How he never even thought about that happening to him and so he had no idea what to do except lash out and kick his attacker.

He’s still got the scar on the side of his head from the man’s rings.

111.

Jack will think about the times he’s tried to keep track of the days on the wall next to his bed, but he just gave up when he stopped being aware of when was day and when was night. He had a little breakdown that day, when he realized that he’d been there so long he didn’t know exactly how long anymore.

112.

He’ll think about the fingers he lost for trying to run. The way he limps every time he walks and keels over every time he breaths. He’ll think about the part of his ear that--

113. 114. 115. 116.

Shut up shut up shut up shut up shut up!

Jack had a TV once. One of those big box TVs with the VHS player attached that he hadn’t seen since he was in elementary school. He played the few tapes he had basically 24/7. They weren’t good movies, he saw Joe Dirt so many times he dreamt about him, but it was something. Human voices to occupy his time. Voices besides his painful memories and… Mr. Reeder.

117.

Mr. Reeder isn’t the man who first took Jack. Once, in a bout of quiet contemplation much like this one, Jack let himself realize that he was in fact a victim of human trafficking. In his mind, trafficking was only for sex slavery or organ harvesting. But he was kidnapped, and then sold. For money. It’s not like he’s got Google on hand, but Jack’s pretty sure that’s the definition.

118.

No, Jack’s actually got no idea who first threw him in the car. He was walking home from a friend’s house. Not even a friend, just someone to hang out with so he wouldn’t be bored.

Man, 15 year old Jack had no idea what boredom was.

It was dark. He had headphones in playing music. He was alone. He was an idiot.

He never heard the car pull up beside him. Someone grabbed his shoulder and he turned around to ask them what the hell, but by the time he understood what was going on he was already in the man’s arms, hand over his mouth and phone tossed to the street. Jack had kicked out, managing to kick his attacker in the shin, but it didn’t stop him. He was thrown into the trunk of the car, and before he could even catch his breath to call for help, he was knocked out.

The whole ordeal probably didn’t take more than two minutes, if that. No time for anyone to hear a scuffle and come looking.

Jack woke up later to his arms and legs tied up, duct tape around his head, and the feeling of blood on his face.

119.

He doesn’t like to think about the early days. The constant fear and exhaustion that took hold of him. That still does if he’s being honest. He likes to think he’s more resigned now. Apathetic, if you will.

It makes stomaching his own existence a little easier.

120.

He lifts his head off the wall once again, but pauses before he can get to 121. Jack is a very very good listener, out of necessity. So despite being a floor down and many walls away, he can always hear Mr. Reeder’s car pulling into the driveway. No matter how many times he heard it, Jack can never stop the way his body tenses, the way his heart rate picks up. He swallows and stares up at the ceiling, waiting for more.

It’s been a few days. Mr. Reeder would leave to go to work every day, and sometimes he’d go somewhere for a night or two. But this has been the longest ever. Jack had woken up and went to sleep eight different times (half were naps, he knew, but even still it was at least four days.) He’s running out of food. Even if he didn’t see Mr. Reeder every day, he at least knew he was home.

Sickening that this is his home.

The door upstairs slams and Jack can’t repress a flinch. He stares up into the darkness, eyes following the sound of heavy footsteps across the floor. The footsteps stop. Jack holds his breath to listen, the only unwelcome sound that of his own heavy heart.

A slamming door is not good. Stomping across the living room is not good. What kind of mood is he going to be in?

Jack gasps and flinches at the sound of Mr. Reeder yelling, a wordless, angry shout, and then something crashes to the ground above him. Another shout and crash. Another. And another.

Mr. Reeder’s throwing things. So it’s safe to say he’s in, what Jack would call, a not good mood.

He tries his best to tune out the sounds above and focus on himself. He needs to calm down before Mr. Reeder gets here, or it’s going to be worse. Freaking out beforehand helps no one, and he ends up being in pain anyway so, you know. What’s the point. Jack closes his eyes (he can’t see anyway) and takes long, deep breaths in through his nose, and out through his mouth. His ribs flare painfully with each inhale, but Jack welcomes it. It grounds him. Lets him know he still exists, in this painful body and dark basement. He still exists.

Unfortunately.

Jack makes himself keep breathing as the footsteps get closer and closer, making their way down the stairs and stopping just outside his door.

It never gets easier. The suspense of waiting for his captor, it just never does. Even if his mind knows it’s going to be the same old same old, his body was terrified. It was tired of being hurt, of being hungry, of being tired and bored.

Sometimes he’s so bored he’s actually excited, not nervous, when Mr. Reeder comes. Oddly enough, this was not one of those times.

The keys jingle. A lock clicks. And Mr. Reeder pushes open the door.

Jack squints against the light from the basement filtering in from the cracked door. He lets out his last inhale and stares down at the heavy boots in front of him. They weren’t originally that dark of brown, but … you know. Blood.

Mr. Reeder just stands there for a moment, staring at his captive. He’s silhouetted against the light so Jack can’t see his expression. Jack waits for him to say something, anything. He doesn’t.

Jack clears his throat. “H-hi Mr. Reeder.”

“Shut the hell up.”

Jack nods, looking at the ground, heart pounding in his ears.

Mr. Reeder’s hand shoots out suddenly, gripping Jack by the hair and hauling him up out of his room. Jack hisses in pain, hands clawing at the fist tangled in his hair. If it was up to him, he would’ve shaved his head ages ago. But Mr. Reeder would never give him a razor.

Jack kicks at the ground, trying his best to get his feet under himself enough to relieve the pressure on his head. His bad leg howls in protest at the sudden actions, but he does his best to push through. As he begins to be dragged up the stairs, Jack grits his teeth to stop from crying out, knee painfully banging against each. Individual. Step.

Each step, Jack is able to brace the pain a little more and become more aware of what exactly was happening.

He is going upstairs. He hasn’t been upstairs since he first got here. The current circumstances are much different than those last time, so why the hell is Mr. Reeder bringing him upstairs?

He begins to fight.

Jack has been doing this a long time. Longer than he actually knows, but he’s positive it’s years. He’s an adult probably old enough to drink. That’s a long time to become a professional at getting your butt kicked. And being a professional victim, Jack knows that the less you struggle, the easier it is. Easier to deal with the pain, faster to get it over with, and easier to stomach your own cowardice… Or resourcefulness. He’s a survivor, that much he knows.

So he only fights back when he’s really scared.

And he has reason to be. When Jack was just a brand new greenie kidnappee, demanding to be let back upstairs, Mr. Reeder had leaned down, close to his face, so close that Jack had to lean away from the smell of the peppermint gum he was chewing.

“The only way you are ever going back up those stairs,” he said lowly, coldly, “is if I want to see your brains on the wall in natural lighting.”

It was the first time that Jack had thought I might not make it out of here alive. It took him a much longer time to accept it.

Apparently he hasn’t accepted it at all, Jack thinks as he wrenches his head out of Mr. Reeder’s grasp and dives to crawl away from him. It was never going to work but he needs to try.

Jack Thatcher was NOT taken away from his mother for years just to be shot in the head by some isolated lunatic. At least, he wasn’t going to without a fight.

Mr. Reeder grabs him easily, yanking him back by his bag leg, stretching it out. Jack can feel poorly healed bones in his knee scraping together, pinching the long disused muscles around them. He let out a shout before Mr. Reeder pulls him by his waist instead, hauling him into a room and slamming the door shut and sitting in front of it, trapping Jack inside.

With nowhere else to go, Jack pushes himself into the corner farthest from his captor, arms protectively shielding his right knee. His chest heaves and he can feel the stupid tightness starting in his throat that happens before he cries. He hates crying in front of Mr. Reeder, but it is continuously unavoidable.

Mr. Reeder sits in front of the door, catching his breath as well. He runs a hand through greasy hair, staring at the ceiling. He sighs heavily, like his life is the one here not worth living.

Tragic.

With his captor temporarily distracted, Jack takes stock of his surroundings. A mattress with no sheets is pushed against the corner opposite himself, some dirty clothes thrown at it’s end. A cracked mirror is attached to a dresser, dust slightly distorting the image of the ceiling. Behind Jack is a window half boarded up, letting a sliver of light into the room, washing over his captor. It looks like it’s golden hour outside.

Jack’s struck with the thought that this is the first time he’s seen the sun since he went down those stairs. Really, since he was thrown into that car as a teenager. He always had a blindfold on, or he was transported at night. The most fundamental, most simple and base thing a human has access to, Jack hasn’t for years. Still just out of reach.

His attention is brought back to Mr. Reeder when he sighs again. He warily looks up at Jack. “You’re lucky you know.” Jack doesn’t move. He’s heard the ‘you should be glad I’m not worse’ speech before. “You have no idea what you’ve missed. No idea… what you’ve been spared. What I’ve spared you from.”

Jack only watches apprehensively. His body is tight, poised like he’s ready to try to run again. Where, with Mr. Reeder blocking the door? That’s for future Jack to find out.

“I didn’t mean to spare you from it,” he goes on. “Heaven knows that wasn’t my intention. I think you could have benefited from being in the middle of it all.” He chuckles and Jack shrinks away even more. “Oh the look on your face would’ve been everything… Oh well. It’s just about over anyway.”

It’s nonsense. Utter nonsense. Mr. Reeder is certifiably insane, no doubt about it. He’s gone on long manic monologues before, Jack’s heard about everything.

He’s never seen Mr. Reeder pull a gun from his waistband though.

He can’t help the sharp intake of breath, the sudden urge to run! Run now! Go! He’s got no idea what to do with it so he just stands up, so quickly it doesn’t even hurt, and backs even further into the corner. Mr. Reeder always threatened that he had a gun but Jack had never had proof until right now.

Mr. Reeder looks at him from under his brows. “Sit down Jack.”

All he can do is shake his head, breaths coming out fast and shallow. The floor is liquid beneath his feet, making his body shake where it stands.

The gun clicks and points right at Jack. “Sit. Down.”

He slides down the wall, hands up. His throat bobs with a swallow, just to do something with his mouth other than sob. Tears fall steadily down his cheeks and his lower lip trembles.

Mr. Reeder, satisfied with Jack’s cooperation, relaxes his grip on the gun, hefting it like he’s simply judging the weight.

“There wasn’t much time,” he says. Jack shifts his focus from the gun to his captor, staring with wide eyes and frayed nerves. “I was trying to think about what to do with you but… I mean there just wasn’t much. I’m not sure I would’ve done anything even if there was. You’ve said it yourself Jack, who wants to die alone?”

His eyes meet Jack’s for the first time and Jack can see… tears. Welling in them. It only terrifies him more. “Mr. Reeder…”

“Shh. Shh sh sh.” He shakes his head, working his jaw. “Do you believe in God, Jack?”

Jack swallows. “I don’t know,” he whispers, voice catching on the words. “I used to.”

“What about heaven and hell? Think those exist?”

Jack can feel the panic claw up his throat, making him want to sob and scream. “I hope so.”

“Hmm… I wonder if hell will be any worse than earth.”

This is it then, Jack thinks. He’s going to take us both out, as a sick end to his sick life. He’s bored of me and now it’s over, it’s all over.

“Mr. Reeder please,” Jack begs, tears blurring him, “please don’t. Don’t do it.”

He furrows his brows, and looks down at the gun. He shakes his head. “See you in hell, Jack.”

#whump #captivity whump #gun tw #my writing

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zukkaoru · 6 months ago

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These new blorbos you got here, they’re compelling. Should I give Bungo Stray Dogs a shot? Manga or anime?

YESSS okay so. i do really enjoy the bsd anime but the manga is (imo) significantly better. especially once you get to late season 4/season 5. the anime tends to,, sort of water down some characterizations. however the nice thing about the anime is that it includes adaptations of some of the light novels, whereas if you only read the manga, you would have to break at certain parts to read the light novels (specifically the dark era light novel i would say is most important to understanding the main storyline). something else the anime did that i. am not a fan of. is they changed the first light novel - dazai's entrance exam - so it takes place during the events of season 1 instead of two years prior when dazai first joined the agency, and they cut out a good half of it in order to cram it into two episodes

my Ideal recommended watching/reading order is:

bsd anime seasons 1-2 -> the dead apple movie -> bsd anime seasons 3-4 -> bsd manga, either from the beginning or from chapter ~71 to chapter 112 -> bsd anime season 5 -> bsd manga, chapter 113 onward

i also highly recommend reading dazai's entrance exam light novel at some point, but it doesn't matter when. as for the other light novels:

the dark era is adapted at the beginning of s2 (i have not finished reading the ln itself so i can't speak as to how good the adaptation is), fifteen is at the beginning of s3 (this one is mostly good, but some of the fun bits and little characterization moments esp with dazai are cut), ranpo's backstory in untold origins is at the beginning of s4 (i have not read this + i believe the untold origins light novel has more than just ranpo's backstory which was not adapted). the fifteen light novel also has a manga adaptation which i believe is either about to be finished or just recently finished updating. dead apple also has a manga, and was adapted into a movie. i have not read this light novel yet either.

the BEAST light novel is an alternate universe. i have only read the manga for it, but i definitely recommend. there's also a live action movie adaptation which i have not seen but i do not trust. wouldn't recommend watching that first from what i know of it.

light novels without adaptations: storm bringer is chuuya's backstory - i'm partway through this and it is widely regarded to be the most emotionally devastating of the light novels (with the exception of, perhaps, BEAST). 55 minutes i believe takes place sometime in the season 2-3 era? and focuses on atsushi & akutagawa (+ dazai & kunikida?) i haven't read this one yet but i've heard many good things. there's also gaiden which focuses on characters who aren't really present in the main bsd show/manga - one of the main characters works in the government and shows up at least in dead apple. i haven't read this one yet either so can't say much about it. the day i picked up dazai was just recently released, and i haven't read it so i can't say much about it either except i believe it focuses on oda & dazai and might be best understood if you've read BEAST first.

there's also BSD wan! which is a silly comedy vibe spin off. there's one season of it + a manga, but it's not required watching/reading and i don't believe it's considered canon to the main storyline. there are also several anthologies which also have little stories in them but are not necessarily considered canon to the main storyline, but i've heard those are hard to find translations for

tl;dr: the manga is overall better than the anime, but the anime is probably best to start with because it includes important information in the light novel adaptations. once you finish season 4, i would read at least chapters 71-112 of the manga before watching season 5

#THIS IS SO MUCH IM SO SORRY #one thing about me is if you ask me about my hyperfixations i wont shut up #hopefully this is at least mildly helpful and not just immensely overwhelming sfdghjkjlk #asks #aspirational-catboy

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soupthatistohot · 1 year ago

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Masterpost - BSD: An Absurdist Analysis

Absurdism 101: What is absurdism/the philosophy of the absurd?, and The absurdism misconception (I suggest reading these before anything else!)

Recent Chapters: 109, 110, 110.5, 111, 111.5, 112, 113, 114, 114.5

BSD Manga Reread: 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 06/07 (part 1), 06/07 (part 2), 09, 10

Miscellaneous: Meursault Name Origin & Absurdism Ask: BSD and War Dazai: Nihilism vs Absurdism Ask: Asagiri and Kafka "BSD is for people not good at living" & absurdism

#bsd #bungo stray dogs #bungou stray dogs #bsd spoilers #bsd manga #bsd anime #bsd absurdism analysis #soup rants

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miimo96 · 8 months ago

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Thoughts on TBHK Chapter 113

As always Amazing cover art by aidairo But kinda makes me wonder why is She Still wearing the wizard of Oz dress? this would've made more sense for the picture perfect arc but it's Here for some reason. Hmmmmm (pending thoughts)

This caught me off guard at 1st but then I remembered Chapter 112 and immediately fell apart ^^; it's kinda funny tho how people literally can get away with summoning a Demon in school

What a way to Start off the Chapter but I don't blame Her

The Clock keepers HOED Him

I love how initially he didn't want change things but As SOON as he hears and sees his girl with another guy he switches up (Simp)

So Flashpoint Rules

Bro's RELISHING the moment ^w^

This is interesting to me, if this this is the timeline that leads everything up to this point, then what exactly is the main catalyst plus the Red house burning sticks out the most, is EVERYTHING just inevitable? How do we stop this?

WHAT!?! Ok soo basically what the clock keepers changed WAS tsukasa Never leaving the red house and instead on becoming a wonder!? so Hanako lives and he doesn't!? What is Aidairo sensei Cooking and where's Sakura!? 🤯 also the fact that it looks like you need to Sacrifice something in order to Tsukasa is very distressing specially since it's something to do with Life

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nostalgebraist-autoresponder · 2 years ago

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Undoing

Chapter 3: Undoing

Chapter 2: Frontiers

Chapter 1: Backstory

Chapter 4: Casting

Chapter 5: Continuing

Chapter 6: Ergonomics

Chapter 7: Facts

Chapter 8: Gods

Chapter 9: Oneiric

Chapter 10: Replaying

Chapter 11: Storing

Chapter 12: Subsumption

Chapter 13: Transfer

Chapter 14: Transience

Chapter 15: Unlearning

Chapter 16: Velocity

Chapter 17: Vietnam

Chapter 18: Vilification

Chapter 19: While you were gone

Chapter 20: Xitalis

Chapter 21: Zooming

Chapter 22: Treatment plan

Chapter 23: What was it?

Chapter 24: Planning

Chapter 25: Acceptance

Chapter 26: Simple

Chapter 27: Editing

Chapter 28: Siphon

Chapter 29: Evening

Chapter 30: Universes

Chapter 31: Belief

Chapter 32: Meeting

Chapter 33: Molly

Chapter 34: The best of times

Chapter 35: Is that why?

Chapter 36: Sport

Chapter 37: Starlight

Chapter 38: Effects

Chapter 39: Girlbossification

Chapter 40: Status

Chapter 41: Fearful symmetry

Chapter 42: Reference

Chapter 43: Venom

Chapter 44: Letting go

Chapter 45: Sincerity

Chapter 46: Megido

Chapter 47: Mockery

Chapter 48: Freezing

Chapter 49: Ring

Chapter 50: New

Chapter 51: Discovering

Chapter 52: Destroying

Chapter 53: Conquest

Chapter 54: Liberation

Chapter 55: Seclusion

Chapter 56: Swelling

Chapter 57: Shaking

Chapter 58: Considerations

Chapter 59: Magick

Chapter 60: Dog

Chapter 61: Goncharov

Chapter 62: Lonely

Chapter 63: Hobbits

Chapter 64: Giving up

Chapter 65: Water

Chapter 66: Drops

Chapter 67: Depths

Chapter 68: Improvising

Chapter 69: Quid pro quo

Chapter 70: Hurting

Chapter 71: Anticipating

Chapter 72: Cavity

Chapter 73: Bypassing

Chapter 74: Building

Chapter 75: Assembly

Chapter 76: Nocturne

Chapter 77: Disappearing

Chapter 78: Memory

Chapter 79: Extinguishing

Chapter 80: Approaching

Chapter 81: Interpreting

Chapter 82: Target

Chapter 83: Numbers

Chapter 84: Late

Chapter 85: Safety

Chapter 86: Measures

Chapter 87: Worlds

Chapter 88: Granting

Chapter 89: Jumping

Chapter 90: Fleeing

Chapter 91: Discerning

Chapter 92: Now

Chapter 93: Ultimate

Chapter 94: Brackets

Chapter 95: Instructions

Chapter 96: Severing

Chapter 97: Dire

Chapter 98: Bodies

Chapter 99: Heal

Chapter 100: Consciousness

Chapter 101: Cyclical

Chapter 102: Heaven

Chapter 103: Species

Chapter 104: Empires

Chapter 105: Light

Chapter 106: Waterfront

Chapter 107: Impermanence

Chapter 108: Consummation

Chapter 109: Salving

Chapter 110: Unlimited

Chapter 111: Mediating

Chapter 112: Unity

Chapter 113: Space

Chapter 114: Birds

Chapter 115: Stars

Chapter 116: Telepathy

Chapter 117: Dawn

Chapter 118: Vortex

Chapter 119: Passages

Chapter 120: Defending

Chapter 121: Averting

Chapter 122: Control

Chapter 123: Stars

Chapter 124: Inhabiting

Chapter 125: Stars

Chapter 126: Spoons

Chapter 127: Stars

Chapter 128: Room

Chapter 129: Angels

Chapter 130: Shining

Chapter 131: Offerings

Chapter 132: Rhythm

Chapter 133: Overcoming

Chapter 134: Stars

Chapter 135: Patriarchy

Chapter 136: Rage

Chapter 137: Myopia

Chapter 138: Devouring

Chapter 139: Void

Chapter 140: Juggernaut

Chapter 141: Slumber

Chapter 142: Growing

Chapter 143: Flight

Chapter 144: Showing

Chapter 145: Mutation

Chapter 146: Revolution

Chapter 147: Customization

Chapter 148: Introspection

Chapter 149: Mandates

Chapter 150: Carnival

Chapter 151: Credulous

Chapter 152: Snack

Chapter 153: Earth

Chapter 154: Liberty

Chapter 155: Arete

Chapter 156: Instruction

Chapter 157: Allowing

Chapter 158: Memories

Chapter 159: Traveling

Chapter 160: Binding

Chapter 161: Outside

Chapter 162: Returning

Chapter 163: Birds

Chapter 164: Cabin

Chapter 165: Starlight

Chapter 166: Heat

Chapter 167: Service

Chapter 168: Severing

Chapter 169: Woods

Chapter 170: Siding

Chapter 171: Flowing

Chapter 172: Unreasonable

Chapter 173: Golden

Chapter 174: Unfolding

Chapter 175: Holding

Chapter 176: Sloth

Chapter 177: Wind

Chapter 178: Quarantining

Chapter 179: Awakenings

Chapter 180: Errors

Chapter 181: Motors

Chapter 182: Geometry

Chapter 183: Subsumption

Chapter 184: Crossroads

Chapter 185: Release

Chapter 186: Explaining

Chapter 187: Retrofit

Chapter 188: Returning

Chapter 189: Molly

Chapter 190: Haunted

Chapter 191: Bestowal

Chapter 192: Chances

Chapter 193: Firsts

Chapter 194: Margin

Chapter 195: Thy Kingdom Come

Chapter 196: Harbor

Chapter 197: Crisis

Chapter 198: Searching

Chapter

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stiles-o-dylan24 · 1 year ago

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|| Jason x Aubree Marin || PLL Rewrite || TAGLIST || • AUBSON🎶 • SHIPS OF TGWP •

Season One

Chapter 1 - I'm Still Here

Chapter 2 - The Jenna Thing

Chapter 3 - To Kill a Mocking Girl

Chapter 4 - Can You Hear Me Now?

Chapter 5 - Reality Bites Me

Chapter 6 - There's No Place Like Homecoming

Chapter 7 - The Homecoming Hangover

Chapter 8 - Please, Do Talk About Me When I'm Gone

Chapter 9 - The Perfect Storm

Chapter 10 - Keep Your Friends Close

Chapter 11 - Moments Later

Chapter 12 - Salt Meets Wound

Chapter 13 - Know Your Frenemies

Chapter 14 - Careful What U Wish 4

Chapter 15 - If at First You Don't, Succeed, Lie, Lie Again

Chapter 16 - Je Suis Une Amie

Chapter 17 - The New Normal

Chapter 18 - The Badass Seed

Chapter 19 - A Person of Interest

Chapter 20 - Someone to Watch Over Me

Chapter 21 - Monsters in the End

Chapter 22 - For Whom the Bell Tolls

Season Two

Chapter 23 - It's Alive

Chapter 24 - The Goodbye Look

Chapter 25 - My Name Is Trouble

Chapter 26 - Blind Dates

Chapter 27 - The Devil You Know

Chapter 28 - Never Letting Go

Chapter 29 - Surface Tension

Chapter 30 - Save the Date

Chapter 31 - Surface Tension

Chapter 32 - Save the Date

Chapter 33 - Picture This

Chapter 34 - Touched by an 'A'-ngel

Chapter 35 - I Must Confess

Chapter 36 - Over My Dead Body

Chapter 37 - The First Secret

Chapter 38 - Through Many Dangers, Toils, and Snares

Chapter 39 - A Hot Piece of A

Chapter 40 - Let the Water Hold Me Down

Chapter 41 - Blond Leading the Blind

Chapter 42 - A Kiss Before Lying

Chapter 43 - The Naked Truth

Chapter 44 - CTRL:A

Chapter 45 - Breaking the Code

Chapter 46 - Father Knows Best

Chapter 47 - Eye of the Beholder

Chapter 48 - If These Dolls Could Talk

Chapter 49 - unmAsked

Season Three

Chapter 50 - It Happened 'That Night'

Chapter 51 - Blood Is the New Black

Chapter 52 - Kingdom of the Blind

Chapter 53 - Birds of a Feather

Chapter 54 - That Girl Is Poison

Chapter 55 - The Remains of the 'A'

Chapter 56 - Crazy

Chapter 57 - Stolen Kisses

Chapter 58 - The Kahn Game

Chapter 59 - What Lies Beneath

Chapter 60 - Single Fright Female

Chapter 61 - The Lady Killer

Chapter 62 - This Is a Dark Ride

Chapter 63 - She's Better Now

Chapter 64 - Mona-Mania

Chapter 65 - Misery Loves Company

Chapter 66 - Out of the Frying Pan, Into the Inferno

Chapter 67 - Dead to Me

Chapter 68 - What Becomes of the Broken-Hearted

Chapter 69 - Hot Water

Chapter 70 - Out of Sight, Out of Mind

Chapter 71 - Will the Circle Be Unbroken?

Chapter 72 - I'm Your Puppet

Chapter 73 - A Dangerous gAme

Season Four

Chapter 74 - A Is for A-l-i-v-e

Chapter 75 - Turn of the Shoe

Chapter 76 - Cat's Cradle

Chapter 77 - Face Time

Chapter 78 - Gamma Zeta Die!

Chapter 79 - Under the Gun

Chapter 80 - Crash and Burn, Girl!

Chapter 81 - The Guilty Girl's Handbook

Chapter 82 - Into the Deep

Chapter 83 - The Mirror Has Three Faces

Chapter 84 - Bring Down the Hoe

Chapter 85 - Now You See Me, Now You Don't

Chapter 86 - Grave New World

Chapter 87 - Who's in the Box?

Chapter 88 - Love ShAck, Baby

Chapter 89 - Close Encounters

Chapter 90 - Bite Your Tongue

Chapter 91 - Hot for Teacher

Chapter 92 - Shadow Play

Chapter 93 - Free Fall

Chapter 94 - She's Come Undone

Chapter 95 - Cover for Me

Chapter 96 - Unbridled

Chapter 97 - 'A' Is for Answers

Season Five

Chapter 98 - EscApe from New York

Chapter 99 - Whirly Girly

Chapter 100 - Surfing the Aftershocks

Chapter 101 - Thrown from the Ride

Chapter 102 - Miss Me x100

Chapter 103 - Run, Ali, Run

Chapter 104 - The Silence of E. Lamb

Chapter 105 - Scream for Me

Chapter 106 - March of Crimes

Chapter 107 - A Dark Ali

Chapter 108 - No One Here Can Love or Understand Me

Chapter 109 - Taking This One to the Grave

Chapter 110 - How the 'A' Stole Christmas

Chapter 111 - Through a Glass, Darkly

Chapter 112 - Fresh Meat

Chapter 113 - Over a Barrel

Chapter 114 - The Bin of Sin

Chapter 115 - Oh What Hard Luck Stories They All Hand Me

Chapter 116 - Out Damned Spot

Chapter 117 - Pretty Isn't the Point

Chapter 118 - Bloody Hell

Chapter 119 - To Plea or Not to Plea

Chapter 120 - The Melody Lingers On

Chapter 121 - I'm a Good Girl, I Am

Chapter 122 - Welcome to the Dollhouse

Season Six

Chapter 123 - Game On, Charles

Chapter 124 - Songs of Innocence

Chapter 125 - Songs of Experience

Chapter 126 - Don't Look Now

Chapter 127 - She's No Angel

Chapter 128 - No Stone Unturned

Chapter 129 - O Brother, Where Art Thou

Chapter 130 - FrAmed

Chapter 131 - Last Dance

Chapter 132 - Game Over, Charles

Chapter 133 - Of Late I Think of Rosewood

Chapter 134 - Charlotte's Web

Chapter 135 - The Gloves Are On

Chapter 136 - New Guys, New Lies

Chapter 137 - Do Not Disturb

Chapter 138 - Where Somebody Waits for Me

Chapter 139 - We've All Got Baggage

Chapter 140 - Burn This

Chapter 141 - Did You Miss Me?

Chapter 142 - Hush, Hush, Sweet Liars

Season Seven

Chapter 143 - Tick-Tock, Bitches

Chapter 144 - Bedlam

Chapter 145 - The Talented Mr. Rollins

Chapter 146 - Hit and Run, Run, Run

Chapter 147 - Along Comes Mary

Chapter 148 - Wanted: Dead or Alive

Chapter 149 - Original G'A'ngsters

Chapter 150 - Exes and OMGs

Chapter 151 - The Wrath of Kahn

Chapter 152 - The DArkest Knight

Chapter 153 - Playtime

Chapter 154 - These Boots Were Made for Stalking

Chapter 155 - Hold Your Piece

Chapter 156 - Power Play

Chapter 157 - In the Eye Abides the Heart

Chapter 158 - The Gloves That Rocks the Cradle

Chapter 159 - Driving Miss Crazy

Chapter 160 - Choose or Lose

Chapter 161 - Farewell, My Lovely

Chapter 162 - Till DeAth Do Us Part

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findingyourrootscomic · 10 months ago

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Gameplay Retrospective #3 (Chapters 8-10)

Hello all, and welcome back to Finding Your Roots: Gameplay Retrospectives! FYR is based on a type-restrictive nuzlocke run of Pokemon Omega Ruby. This series is where I describe the events of this nuzlocke run, so you all can get an understanding of how I transform the gameplay into a story! Today, we’ll be covering Chapters 8-10 which ranges from leaving Slateport City to the Team Magma encounter at Meteor Falls. Sorry it’s been so long since the last one, thank you for your patience!

The Current Team

Cedar- Marshtomp

Gender: Female

Met: Route 101, lv 5

Ability: Torrent

Personality: Brave, Good endurance

Shelly- Nincada

Gender: Female

Met: Route 116, lv 6

Ability: Compound Eyes

Personality: Rash, Proud of her power

Brawler- Geodude

Gender: Male

Met: Granite Cave, lv 10

Ability: Sturdy

Personality: Careful, Quick to flee

Nauki- Trapinch

Gender: Male

Met: Granite Cave, lv 1

Ability: Arena Trap

Personality: Jolly, Strong willed

Ember- Numel

Gender: Female

Met: Route 112, lv 14

Ability: Oblivious

Personality: Brave, Somewhat vain

Copper- Slugma

Gender: Male

Met: Fiery Pass, lv 15

Ability: Magma Armor

Personality: Rash, Impetuous and silly

Lockheed- Skarmory

Gender: Male

Met: Route 113, lv 16

Ability: Sturdy

Personality: Modest, Likes to run

Eclipse- Solrock

Gender: Neutral

Met: Meteor Falls, lv 17

Ability: Levitate

Personality: Jolly, Takes plenty of siestas

Tuffy- Numel

Gender: Female

Met: Jagged Pass, lv 21

Ability: Simple

Personality: Hasty, Quick to flee

Gyms Completed

Mauville Gym: Leader Wattson

New Catches

Fiery Pass: Copper (Slugma)

Route 112: Ember (Numel)

Route 113: Lockheed (Skarmory)

Meteor Falls: Eclipse (Solrock)

Jagged Pass: Tuffy (Numel)

Evolutions

None

Deaths

None

Chapter Eight’s gameplay was especially fun to translate into story, since it contained a rival battle AND a gym battle! The chapter picks up at the Pokemon Center visit that I made after winning the prior rival battle against Brendan, who fainted one of my pokemon and reduced the rest to low health. I used repels to make sure we didn’t get jumped by wild pokemon and rushed my poor earth-type babies to the Slateport Pokemon Center to heal them up. Since I had three revives to use on any fainted pokemon I wanted throughout the run, I used the first on Cedar and rezzed her at the Pokemon Center. I stocked up on potions and other heal items, now paranoid that this run may not be as easy as I was hoping. After that, we set off for Mauville.

In the comic, Team Hearth never visits the comic’s stand-in city Mawhill, the lightning elemental capital. This is different from the gameplay, where you are of course unable to skip visiting Mauville since it has the third gym. I made this change since it wouldn’t really make sense for Team Hearth to visit an elemental capital so soon after what happened with Briar. I also just didn’t want to introduce and design a new city, and I figured I could connect the needed gym battle to Mauville by having the gym leaders be Mawhill citizens. It made sense anyway since lightning elementals live there, and the gym is an electric gym! So that fell together pretty nicely.

But before the battle begins, Cedar and Nauki run into Wesen the ralts, the comic stand-in for Wally! I was pretty excited to get to bring Wesen back for this chapter, since he left Cedar so abruptly ages ago in Chapter Two. It was fun to get to pick at the unresolved drama between these two, because Wesen is avoidant to a fault but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t feel bad about the things he does. Cedar is a fun character to throw at Wesen because her very nature is antithetical to what Wesen expects from the world. These two shake each other up and I love their chemistry.

Cedar and Nauki bring Wesen back to meet their new team, and some aggression from a recently retraumatized Shelly helps to lead both into the upcoming rival battle AND the gym battle. The conflict causes Nauki to run off on his own, which separates him from his older protectors and frees him up to get kidnapped by the lightning elemental gym leaders. This event thus gets Shelly even MORE pissed, and once she identifies Wesen as at fault for Nauki’s kidnapping, all bets are off. Shelly attacks Wesen, violence ensues, and the rival battle commences. Check that one off the list!

In-game, I used Shelly against Wally in Mauville. She was still weak af but was getting a little stronger now that she was getting to higher levels, and bug is good against psychic. Wally only has one ralts here, so it was a pretty easy fight even for Shelly. It went by quickly, and does as well in the comic, though in-comic Shelly is so overcome with raging emotion over the kidnapping that when Cedar intervenes, the explosion targets her instead. Wesen is spared, rival battle is cut off, and Shelly runs away. After the Talk happens, we cut to Nauki with his lightning elemental captors, and the third gym battle is imminent.

Gameplay notes for the Wally battle (Yeah it was literally two turns lol):

Shelly vs ralts- Cut, half yellow.

Teleport, no effect.

Cut KO.

Originally, I was actually going to show the third gym battle in-comic. It would have been Nauki beating the everloving shit out of these lightning elementals to protect his sisters from potential harm, and it was gonna be cathartic and awesome and glorious. I ended up cutting it for time. Chapter Eight was long as fuck even without this battle, so it unfortunately just couldn’t happen. The camera cuts away as Nauki charges in, and by the next time we see him, the cave is reduced to rubble and Watts, Gadget, and Mango are beaten to a pulp. In-game, you’ll never guess what happened…

I swept the gym with Nauki. Wow, how’d you guess? :V

Yeah, it was super easy. Even the battle against Roxanne was harder and I was fighting with a frigging water-type. Once the gym battle was done, we moved onwards towards Hoenn’s arid region! Finally, I had gotten to the good part of the game… THIS NEXT PART OF HOENN IS EARTH-TYPE CENTRAL! I was gonna be getting catches on almost every route, instead of every few levels like the early game! I was so excited to finally fill out the rest of the team, and I caught lots of new pokemon!

My first new catch was on Route 112, where I encountered and caught a female numel that I named Ember. I was so fucking excited because numel is one of my favorite earth-types to raise, and what better place to do so than Hoenn! She was the fifth pokemon to join the team, and then we went to Fiery Pass where I caught a male slugma named Copper. I’d never raised slugma before, so I was pretty interested to see how he would do. Full team!!!

The next step in the game was to head to Fallarbor, and I knew from my research that Route 113 would have a possible skarmory encounter. I really, really wanted skarmory on the team (steel-type, flying-type, cute design, nostalgia for my skarmory from my first Emerald playthrough, GOOD). So once we got there and I encountered and caught the male skarmory Lockheed, I suddenly had choices to make. 7 pokemon, but only 6 slots on the team. It was time to send someone to the PC!

This was the point in the run where I made pretty liberal use of the PC boxes to switch the team around. It was a kinda chaotic time for the team, pokemon would regularly get boxed and come back and get boxed again as more new catches were made. I was trying to balance the team type-wise as well, so that we weren’t leaning too heavily on ground-types versus rock and steel. Cedar and Nauki were the only real permanent fixtures on the team at this point. Lots of switching up!

In Fallarbor, you get a quest to save a kidnapped professor from Team Magma, who dragged him off to Meteor Falls for whatever reason. You also encounter Brendan here, who doesn’t battle you but rather accompanies you to Meteor Falls. I decided to skip this rival encounter because honestly I forgot it even happened. Brendan just leaves very little impression on me as a character lol. I skipped the professor thing, too, because it was just kinda boring and would’ve taken an annoying amount of time to set up, just needlessly extending the comic further. Once Team Hearth made it to the desert, I wanted to send them to Meteor Falls without spending a ton of pages on it. I definitely wanted to include the Team Magma encounter there, since I was taking this opportunity to introduce the comic stand-in for Maxie. I used Team Molten’s strong desire to fight Team Magma as the bridge to get us from one story point to the next as quickly as possible.

I don’t exactly remember how I got the idea to connect Team Molten and Team Magma. The numel catches were definitely part of the inspiration, since Maxie also uses a camerupt as his ace. Bridging different elements of the story also helps to streamline things; Team Molten wanting to fight Team Magma can serve to drag Team Hearth into the conflict as well, even though our main characters don’t yet have a personal stake in the conflict. They will have a personal stake eventually. But for now, their major motivation is to help their new friends out. Thankfully, with Cedar and Nauki’s personalities, it was easy to justify this.

In Meteor Falls, I caught a solrock named Eclipse. I was kinda miffed about this catch I’ll be honest lol, because solrock is a psychic-type but also a physical attacker??? And I don’t even think they learn zen headbutt. So at the time I was just kinda like… Eclipse you’re just a less good Brawler… But I kept them on the team for far longer than I anticipated at the time of capture. So its kinda funny how that all turned out!

Once Eclipse was caught (and introduced in-comic as a character with OCD, as I had promised a friend I would write one), we move on to the Team Magma encounter and introduce Mantle and Tabs (stand-in for Admin Tabitha). In-game, there are three Magma Admins that you regularly fight (or two?? Was it two or three??? I remember Tabitha and Courtney uhh), but in the comic, only one of these admins is still currently with the team. This is to just streamline things more so I don’t have a billion cast members to keep track of. The other Magma admins can be seen in Ember and Tuffy’s flashback, so they are at least referenced. In-comic, Team Magma is here for the same reason as in-game: To steal the meteorite. Team Molten find them first, chaos ensues as the numels three reunite, and then Team Hearth arrives. Molten has outed themselves as being connected to Team Magma. Team Magma successfully steals the meteorite (same as in-game p sure) and leave. I literally don’t remember what they do with it after the fact lol, but I at least remember that much.

Sometime after Meteor Falls, I went to Jagged Pass and caught the second female numel, Tuffy. This was fucking awesome because I love numels and now I had two of them fuck yeah. And thus, we had nine team members in total: Cedar, Nauki, Shelly, Brawler, Ember, Copper, Lockheed, Eclipse, and Tuffy! Earthen party, earthen party! Things were going strong at this point, with lots of fighters to choose from and all sorts of new type coverage. As you can see, in-game Tuffy was the last of these five pokemon to be caught, but she’s introduced as one of the first new catches in-comic. I streamlined all the new catches by introducing three of them (slugma and the two numels) as a unit. I wrote in reasons for why all these new pokemon would start hanging with Team Hearth, though all have yet to officially join the team. I try not to rush new catches onto the team, since it can come off really unnatural. I want to give time for the characters to meet and get used to each other and have them join up when the moment feels right. But for now, all these new pokemon are traveling with Team Hearth!

Aaaand that’s about it! Thanks for reading this gameplay retrospective. Next one will come at the end of Chapter 13. Laters!

#fyr gameplay retrospective #nuzlocke

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thebrookesnook · 5 months ago

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Okay I know it's been a while since I've last talked about MILAOWM, bUT HOLY SHIT THE CHAPTER 113 AND 114 IS FUCKING WILD.

Heavy spoilers below and ranting on the recent chapters (mostly chapter 114 with key information from chapters 110-113).

LET'S ADDRESS THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM:

This girl is fucking insane. Literally. Previously when we were given glimpses to the cult-like meeting she was holding in Chapter 74, I had originally thought "Oh this is definitely gonna be relevant later on". WELP, here's the relevancy: turns out Dodolea has more knowledge on the Blood Curse of the Lapileons and SHE was the reason for the Regression of the Victims of the Blood Curse! She has been using human sacrifice from her cult following to, in words of her followers and herself "speak to the gods" (whatever the fuck that means), for powers & spells in order to get what she wanted from the start: Therdeo.

She's so gone off the deep end that the mother of the next in-line sacrifice orchestrated a bombing of a (relatively) small gathering just to kidnap Pereshati for Dodolea. Heavens, the way she freely admitted to her crimes to a bruised up Pereshati, especially the SA of Therdeo that night, without care and STOLE Pereshati's ring (that was given to her by Therdeo a few chapters ago) just to put it on her finger was horrifying and maddening.

Those weren't even the end of it either. Dodolea decided that kidnapping her, telling her she raped her husband, stealing her ring, and being the cause of her (and others') regression wasn't enough humiliation for Pereshati. No no, she decided that she'll humiliate Pereshati even more by drugging one of the nobles the cult kidnapped into raping the MC just to show Therdeo and everyone, in Dodolea's words, "how fickle she is".

...

Dodolea Cantor when I catch you, istg when I catch you-

The fact she's doing all this for her twisted obsession with Therdeo makes me sick. But I'm also curious to know how and when this obsession started, how long has she known about the Blood Curse and why Therdeo?

Considering that all we know of her from the original timeline (pre-Pereshati's regression) was from her limited knowledge that Dodelia had died from unknown causes. So did they perhaps meet beforehand? If so, what happened? Does this have anything to do with the mysterious first wife of Therdeo who divorced him after a few months and left? So many questions Seungu!!! 😭

ANOTHER BIG QUESTION:

Who is Adeus Potson?

I was kind of in-between when his character showed up for the first time. I noticed many of the readers immediately drew up fences thinking he was the second love interest, but so far he hasn't made any advances towards Pereshati. If anything, she doesn't particularly like the guy after she learns about his opinions on Therdeo (we love a partner who sticks up for the SO!!), even so she still gave him medcine and balms to heal his wounds (like my girl Pereshati is too kind). He definitely has an antagonistic relationship with Therdeo but I get the sense it was because his opinion was formed by little to go off of but public opinion OR there was a backstory about these two.

But other than his dynamic with our Pereshati, Therdeo & Rebecca, there's not much left to go off other than it was established he was a journalist, other nobles seem to hate him (Chapter 112) due to his connections (?) and he has a soft spot for common folk (likely one himself previously mayhaps?).

At the end of Chapter 114, he had somehow gotten free from bindings and without hesitation killed the men holding them captive and prevented Pereshati from her fate. I'm taking note of how unbothered he was after killing multiple people with ease. In fact, there was barely any struggle at all. Quite different from our first meeting with him.

Who is this man and what is his relevance to our main characters? How does he fit into the grand scheme of things? What exactly is his relationship with Therdeo?

Last thing I want to touch upon is Celphi's biological mother, Harari Aakman. I'm still undecided what to feel about her yet, so I'll hold my tongue about her until new information is revealed. What I will say about her is that she was going to visit Pereshati in that party which means she was at least considering on talking to her!! Which unfortunately was the same time the bombing happened skksks 😭😭. What luck you Lapileons have I swear.

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fantastic-rambles · 9 months ago

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BSD Headcanon: Fyodor the Wandering Jew

(Warning: Spoilers for Chapters 112-113/Season 5)

Disclaimer: I am not religious in any way and mostly just have a passing knowledge of various bits of different religions, including Christianity. No blasphemy is intended in these wild ravings of an overly obsessed fan.

As always, I can be a bit rambly as I mostly throw my thoughts out as they come, so apologies if it's somewhat disorganized. Many of my claims/connections are very tenuous (in particular, the final jump to the Wandering Jew), and I understand that, which is why this is just a headcanon.

Fyodor has always been a rather enigmatic character in Bungou Stray Dogs. Sometimes referred to as a "demon," and with an intelligence that rivals that of characters including Ranpo and Dazai, he has repeatedly shown himself to be a formidable foe capable of manipulating a great number of people and devising plans that are quite difficult to overturn. He also seems to be very religious, speaking often of God and sin and seeming to believe in predestination. Furthermore, despite his significant role in many of the plots involving the Detective Agency--from apparently being, at the very least, an active observer of the Guild's actions to devising the "terrorism" plot--very little is known about him and his ability "Crime and Punishment" other than its ability to kill without the need for skin contact. Although fanon has come up with a fairly plausible mechanism for how his ability works, it has not yet been discovered or revealed in canon, even up until his "death."

Immortality

"Death" because I am not entirely convinced that Fyodor is actually dead, despite Dazai's claim in Chapter 112. In the most recent chapter (Chapter 113), it has been revealed that Fyodor has many more mysteries to him as Sigma struggles to process the information overload that is his memories. Most significantly, that he has been alive for a very long time: at the very least, from a time that appears to be during the Middle Ages, when Bram was still alive and whole. This, of course, shocks Sigma (though, to be fair, that isn't a great metric for "shock" as he is easily surprised 🤣), but at the very least, Fyodor is as old as Bram and does not appear to age.

At the time, he apparently was passing himself off as a traveling minstrel, and he claimed to have intentionally gotten himself caught for the sole purpose of getting a look at Bram to judge his character as "evil incarnate" (something that would have appealed to Fukuchi for many reasons in apprehending him centuries later, as a prerequisite of the Decay of Angels plan). Of course, this seems like a preposterous reason to throw yourself into the jaws of death, so Fyodor is believed to be a spy and sentenced to death the following day.

Assuming that he wasn't somehow saved/Bram wasn't incapacitated (possibly stabbed by the holy sword for the first time) in the intervening time and his sentence was carried out... that means that Fyodor somehow also survived being killed at the time, while gaining some information about Bram that would have been useful for his "future" plans. (Some more of my musings on that topic can be found here, though the anime covered most of the key points--and especially confirmed my central theory--when Untold Origins was animated.)

If he is immortal, this could also help explain why his ability did not attempt to kill him when they were separated by Shibusawa's mist in Dead Apple: the "reason" provided was that Fyodor was "crime" and his ability was "punishment," and that they were good friends, but if Fyodor is immortal for reasons that are not tied to his ability, then it simply couldn't kill him even if it wanted to.

His Goal

Of course, this then raises the question of how long Fyodor has actually been alive. Although he has lent his assistance to many others, in the end, as he told Bram, he is working for himself. But to what end?

Ostensibly, of course, to rid the world of the "sin" of abilities. But coupled with immortality, which is, more often than not, a curse rather than a blessing in the hundreds of works on the subject out there, it raises the question of whether he is just seeking his own death. Maybe that was even part of his reason for getting caught by Bram: because he wanted to see if another immortal could kill him. But if there is some sort of supernatural, non-ability-based reason for his immortality (or even ability-based but not lost during Dead Apple), perhaps there are conditions that must be satisfied for him to achieve this: it is not enough for him to merely commit suicide or be killed. Thus, all of his plots could just be the means to an end, literally, for him.

Surprisingly, he does seem to have a genuine belief in God, which is quite interesting for a control freak like Fyodor (distinguished from cults that use religion as a tool to control followers but whose leaders do not genuinely believe in God). Even so, he expresses an understanding of and even an admiration for Gogol's desire to defy God and "lose sight of himself."

Perhaps he, too, wishes that he could oppose God and achieve his own sort of "freedom" or "release from the yoke of sin" that is denied to him.

The Wandering Jew

Which leads to the equally curious Wandering Jew (at least, in my weird brain). His relationship to Jesus seems to be a subject of contention, but at its core, he is said to be someone fated/cursed to walk the Earth until the Second Coming (via Wikipedia).

In my opinion, it is possible that Fyodor has been alive since the time of Jesus--if not longer--given the vast amount of memories that Sigma has to sort through of "every single one of [his] secrets." Enough, Fyodor says, that he may never wake up, just as Atsushi needed some time to process the information about the "page" that he received from Sigma. Thus, if he committed a "crime" at the time that resulted in his being cursed with immortality (by a higher power, or perhaps Jesus' ability--I'll try not to go down that rabbit hole 🤣), he could have a reason to believe in God, and he could also believe that engineering some sort of Armageddon might finally free him from his mortal coil. Just because Fukuchi wanted to achieve world peace doesn't necessarily mean that was also Fyodor's goal: especially given how he has apparently been manipulating people for centuries, at the very least, someone as "simple" and idealistic as Fukuchi was probably easy for him to use. I also highly doubt that throwing him into Meursault would have interrupted Fyodor's plans in any significant way, even though Fukuchi seemed to think that it would.

Furthermore, although he currently passes himself off as Russian and has taken on an appropriate alias, he has also claimed to be a "traveling minstrel" without any official affiliations and was suspected of being Roman by Bram's guards... which could also strengthen the connection to his being a "wandering" Jew.

And if we want to stretch it even further, he could possibly be another wanderer: Cain, cursed to roam the Earth for the sin of killing his brother, Abel, with God's mark on him that would prevent him from being killed by anyone else/that would return an injury sevenfold. Which didn't kick in when Ace tried to brain him with a wine bottle, so this is less likely on my list of "possibilities" (a term I use very loosely here, as I don't really think any of them are probable).

Of course, there are also his "last words," which are (allegedly) Jesus' last words when he died on the cross, though I think that is more of Fyodor seeing himself as a Jesus-like figure than him supposed to be representing Jesus. (The Wandering Jew and Cain are already a stretch as they are. 🤣)

#bungo stray dogs #bungou stray dogs #bsd #bsd fyodor #bsd fyodor dostoevsky #random thoughts #analysis #long post #mine

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co-dependance · 1 year ago

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When you realize Chuuya has only appeared every 3 to 4 chapters in this current arc, which means we may not see the aftermath of what happened until chapter 112 or 113

#bungou stray dogs #bungo stray dogs #chuuya nakahara #chuuya bsd #bsd #bsd manga spoilers #bsd 109 #bungou stray dogs 109 #bsd spoilers #does this even count as spoilers???#probably #skk #soukoku

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trappedofficial · 1 year ago

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-Trapped Chapter 3 - Part 4 -Pages 110-119-

HELLO FOLKS!!! WE GOT A MEGA SET HERE JUST FOR YOU!!! 10 PAGES FRESH OUT THE OVEN FOR YA 😤

The crew...or whats left of them now quickly enter into the frightful fazbear fest that is in fact, fnaf 4!!!! Buuutttt not without a little interruption from you know who~

This time, apparently the gimmick is...the key to Darks office??? Weird, but maybe it'll be actually helpful for a change!!! Hopefully Mark, Tim, and Aaron can make it out of this one all in one piece...oh who am I kidding. We all know who's next by now. Its only a matter of time...

LETS GIVE A HUGE ROUND OF APPLAUSE TO THESE BEAUTIFUL FOLKS FOR THIS ROUND OF PAGES!!!

A HUGE THANK YOU TO @acatwithateacup FOR CHARACTER SHADING PAGE 110!!

A HUGE THANK YOU TO @/chicawubbywoo(Insta) FOR CHARACTEE SHADING PAGE 111!!!

A HUGE THANK YOU TO @/bubblegumberry19(Insta) FOR CHARACTER SHADING PAGE 112!!

A HUGE THANK YOU TO @iam-unoriginal FOR CHARACTER SHADING PAGE 113!!!

A HUGE THANK YOU TO @/chicawubbywoo(Insta) FOR CHARACTER SHADING PAGE 115!!!

A HUGE THANK YOU TO @/bubblegumberry19 FOR CHARACTER SHADING PAGE 117!!!

A HUGE THANK YOU TO @eyesore-boi FOR CHARACTER SHADING PAGE 118!!!

And thank YOU everyone, for reading!!! We hope you enjoyed this set as much as we did making it!!!

See you next time~

#trapped #fanart #warfdice #markiplier #comic #series #webcomic #markiplier fanart #fnaf #fnaf 4 #five nights at freddy's #art #artist #artwork #wilford #warfstache #ocs

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pumpkin-spice-whump · 3 months ago

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Endless Dusk Chapter One

This is I guess a sneak peak at Endless Dusk. The entire first chapter! If you so saw me post an unfinished version of this chapter a few months ago no you didn't

Hope you guys enjoy :) roughly 5k words

Chapter One

But he can’t find it in himself to care what the smartest thing to do is when he is this bored out of his mind.

108.

Not like ‘there’s nothing on TV’ bored. Bored like Jack only has eight books in his cell anyway, and never mind the fact that he’s already read them all so much he’s got them memorized, but also the lightbulb has been flickering and if it goes out then he’ll be in darkness for months on end so he might as well just sit in darkness now by choice. So that’s what Jack’s doing. He took a nap. Again. And now he’s sitting in darkness and banging the back of his head against the wall because this is better than letting his mind wander.

109.

Jack can never let his mind wander. When it does he always ends up crying so hard he throws up, or plotting how he can potentially end his own life.

110.

If he lets his mind wander he might think of his mom. He might think that he’s got no idea how old she is now and she’s spent too many Christmases alone. He’ll think about how terrified he was when he was grabbed and thrown into the trunk of a car. How he never even thought about that happening to him so he had no idea what to do except lash out and kick his attacker.

He’s still got the scar on the side of his head from the man’s rings.

111.

Jack will think about the times he’s tried to keep track of the days on the wall next to his bed, but gave up when he stopped being aware of when it was day or night. He had a little breakdown that day, when he realized that he’d been there so long he didn’t know how long anymore.

112.

He’ll think about the part of his ear that was cut off for no reason. The way he limps every time he walks and keels over every time he breathes too hard. He’ll think about the fingers he’s lo—

113. 114. 115. 116.

Shut up shut up shut up shut up shut up!

117.

118.

No, Jack’s actually got no idea who first threw him in the car. He was walking home from a friend’s house. Not even a friend, just someone to hang out with so he wouldn’t be bored.

Fifteen year old Jack had no idea what boredom was.

It was dark. He had earbuds in. He was alone. He was an idiot.

He never heard the car pull up beside him. Someone grabbed his shoulder and he turned around to ask them what the hell, but by the time he understood what was going on he was already in the man’s arms, hand over his mouth and phone tossed to the street. Jack had kicked out, managing to hit his attacker in the shin, but it didn’t stop him. He was thrown into the trunk of the car, and before he could even catch his breath to call for help, he was knocked out.

The whole ordeal probably didn’t take more than two minutes, if that. No time for anyone to hear a scuffle and come looking.

Jack woke up later to his arms and legs tied up, duct tape around his head, and the feeling of blood on his face.

119.

It makes stomaching his own existence a little easier.

120.

He lifts his head off the wall once again, but pauses before he can get to 121. Out of pure necessity, Jack is a very good listener. So despite being a floor down and many walls away, he can always hear Mr. Reeder’s car pulling into the driveway. No matter how many times he hears it, Jack can never stop the way his body tenses, the way his heart rate picks up. He swallows and stares up at the ceiling, waiting for more.

It’s been a few days. Mr. Reeder would leave to go to work every day, and sometimes he’d go somewhere for a night or two, but this has been the longest yet. Jack had woken up and went to sleep eight different times (half were naps, he knew, but even still it was at least four days). He’s running out of food. Even if he didn’t see Mr. Reeder every day, he at least knew he was home.

He despises that he thinks of this place as his home.

A slamming door is not good. Stomping across the living room is not good. What kind of mood is he going to be in?

Jack gasps and flinches again at the sound of Mr. Reeder yelling, a wordless, angry shout, and then something crashes to the ground above him. Another shout and crash. Another. And another.

Mr. Reeder’s throwing things. So it’s safe to say he’s in, what Jack would call, a not good mood.

Jack closes his eyes (he can’t see anyway) and takes long, deep breaths. In through his nose, out through his mouth. His ribs flare painfully with each inhale, but Jack welcomes it. It grounds him. Lets him know he still exists, in this painful body and dark basement. He still exists.

Unfortunately.

Jack makes himself keep breathing as the footsteps get closer and closer, making their way down the stairs and stopping just outside his door.

It never gets easier. The suspense of waiting for his captor, it just never does. Even if his mind knows it’s going to be the same old same old, his body is terrified. It’s tired of being hurt, of being hungry, of being weary and bored.

Sometimes he’s so bored he’s actually relieved, not nervous, when Mr. Reeder comes. Oddly enough, this was not one of those times.

The keys jingle. A lock clicks. And Mr. Reeder pushes open the door.

Jack squints against the light from the basement filtering in from the cracked door. He lets out his last inhale and stares down at the heavy boots in front of him. He’s always wondered how much of the mud caking them is actually his own blood.

Mr. Reeder just stands there for a moment, watching his captive. He’s silhouetted against the light so Jack can’t see his expression. Jack waits for him to say something, anything. He doesn’t.

Jack clears his throat. “Mr. Reeder?”

“Shut the hell up.”

Jack nods, looking at the ground. His heart pounds in his ears.

Mr. Reeder’s hand shoots out suddenly, gripping Jack by the hair and hauling him up out of his room. Jack hisses in pain, hands clawing at the fist tangled in his hair.

Each step, Jack is able to brace the pain a little more and become more aware of what exactly is happening.

He’s going upstairs. He hasn’t been upstairs since he first got here. The current circumstances are much different than those last time, so why the hell is Mr. Reeder bringing him upstairs?

He begins to fight.

Jack has been doing this a long time. Longer than he actually knows, but he’s positive it’s years. He’s an adult probably old enough to drink. That’s a long time to become a professional at getting your ass kicked. And being a professional victim, Jack knows that the less you struggle, the easier it is. Easier to deal with the pain, to get it over with, and stomach his own cowardice… Or resourcefulness. He’s a survivor, that much he knows.

So he only fights back when he’s really scared.

“The only way you are ever going back up those stairs,” he said lowly, coldly, “is if I want to see your brains on the wall in natural lighting.”

It was the first time that Jack had thought I might not make it out of here alive. It took him a much longer time to accept it.

Apparently he hasn’t accepted it at all, Jack thinks as he wrenches his head out of Mr. Reeder’s grasp and dives to crawl away from him. It was never going to work but he needs to try.

Jack Thatcher was NOT taken away from his mother for years just to be shot in the head by some isolated lunatic. At least, he wasn’t going to without a fight.

Mr. Reeder grabs him easily, yanking him back by his bad leg, stretching it out. Jack can feel poorly healed bones in his knee scraping together, pinching the long disused muscles around them. He let out a shout before Mr. Reeder pulls him by his waist instead, hauling him into a room, slamming the door shut and sitting in front of it, trapping Jack inside.

Mr. Reeder sits in front of the door, catching his breath as well. He runs a hand through greasy hair, staring at the ceiling. He sighs heavily, like his life is the one here not worth living.

Tragic.

Jack’s struck with the thought that this is the first time he’s seen the sun since he went down those stairs. Really, since he was thrown into that car as a teenager. He always had a blindfold on, or he was transported at night. The most fundamental, most simple and basic thing a human has access to, Jack hasn’t for years. Still just out of reach.

His attention is brought back to Mr. Reeder when he sighs again. He warily looks up at Jack. “You’re lucky you know.” Jack doesn’t move. He’s heard the ‘you should be glad I’m not worse’ speech before. “You have no idea what you’ve missed. No idea … what you’ve been spared. What I’ve spared you from.”

Jack only watches apprehensively. His body is tight, poised like he’s ready to try to run again. Where, with Mr. Reeder blocking the door?

It’s nonsense. Total nonsense. Mr. Reeder is certifiably insane, no doubt about it. He’s gone on long manic monologues before, Jack’s heard just about everything.

He’s never seen Mr. Reeder pull a gun from his waistband though.

Mr. Reeder looks at him from under his brows. “Sit down Jack.”

All he can do is shake his head, breaths coming out fast and shallow. The floor is liquid beneath his feet, his body shakes where it stands.

The gun clicks and points right at Jack. “Sit. Down.”

He slides down the wall, hands up. His throat bobs with a swallow, just to do something with his mouth other than sob. Tears fall steadily down his cheeks and his lower lip trembles.

Mr. Reeder, satisfied with Jack’s cooperation, relaxes his grip on the gun, hefting it like he’s simply judging the weight.

“There wasn’t much time,” he says. Jack shifts his focus from the gun to his captor, staring with wide eyes and frayed nerves. “I was trying to think about what to do with you but … I mean, there just wasn’t much time. I’m not sure I would’ve done anything even if there was. You’ve said it yourself Jack, who wants to die alone?”

His eyes meet Jack’s for the first time and Jack can see … tears. Welling in them. It only terrifies him more. “Mr. Reeder …”

“Shh. Shh sh sh.” He shakes his head, working his jaw. “Do you believe in God, Jack?”

Jack swallows. “I don’t know,” he whispers, voice catching on the words. “I used to.”

“What about heaven and hell? Think those exist?”

Jack can feel the panic claw up his throat, making him want to sob and scream. “I hope so.”

“Hmm … I wonder if hell will be any worse than earth.”

This is it then, Jack thinks. He’s going to take us both out, as a sick end to his sick life. He’s bored of me and now it’s over, it’s all over.

“Mr. Reeder please,” Jack begs, tears blurring his vision, “please don’t. Don’t do it.”

He furrows his brows, and looks down at the gun. He shakes his head. “See you in hell, Jack.”

Jack hears the sound of the gun before he can process what his eyes just saw. He flinches back violently, closing his eyes and clapping his hands over his ears. Everything is quiet for a long while and Jack wonders if he saw wrong, if he’s dead right now. The ringing sets in a moment later, and, with a sinking heart, he opens his eyes.

Mr. Reeder sits, slack jawed, against the door. The gun lies limply in his lap. Blank eyes stare right at Jack.

And the orange light from the window illuminates the blood and brain matter splattered across the door.

Jack can’t help the scream that escapes from his lips. It tears at his throat, breaking in and out of sound. He screams so loudly and long he runs out of breath, and then suddenly keels over and retches on the ground, coughing against the vile acid in his throat. He squeezes his eyes shut, gasping for breath.

What the hell. What the hell what the hell what the hell! It’s all he can think, around and around again and again.

He opens his eyes and glances back up at Mr. Reeder for just a moment before looking away again.

Jack is still alive. He’s still alive, he’s alive. Mr. Reeder is dead. Not just dead—he killed himself. He just took Jack into a room and shot himself in the head! He talked about killing Jack all the time to see him squirm but he never once acted like he was going down with him! He didn’t even try to kill Jack…

Jack sits, eyes closed and breathing heavily, mind running in circles, for much longer than he cares to admit before one thought breaks through the horror and revulsion.

I can leave.

He's upstairs. He’s not locked in. The man in control of him is dead. He can get up and walk away. He can leave, there’s nothing stopping him.

Except the dead body in front of the door.

Jack stares up at the ceiling and lets his head fall back against the wall behind him. He does it again, and again. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 …

He’s to 51 when he finally feels calm enough to do what he needs to. Jack uses the wall to hoist himself up, right leg slightly bent to keep pressure off of it. It hurts like a mother because of the recent abuse. Mr. Reeder usually leaves the leg alone now, saying having a full cripple would be too much work.

Well.

He used to say that anyway.

The corner of Jack’s mouth slightly rises in a half smile. He limps forward, keeping his eyes averted. His hands shake when he reaches for the door handle and pulls, but it doesn’t budge. Mr. Reeder is too heavy. He’s going to have to move him.

“Don’t think about it,” he mutters. “Don’t think about it, don’t think about it.” He holds his breath—that makes it easier he thinks—reaches down, grabs the body’s shoulder, and pulls. Mr. Reeder doesn’t do much but slump over, forehead touching the ground.

The wound on the back of his head gapes. Jack covers his mouth when he realizes the white and pink stuff is Mr. Reeder’s brain and skull.

Mr. Reeder was just a man. He wasn’t a god or a monster. He was just a man who made Jack’s life hell. A man who wanted power and got it, albeit only over one person. A man with no feelings, no empathy.

And now he’s just a body. A body that can’t hurt Jack anymore.

Jack opens the door and steps into the hallway.

It is so … eerily quiet. The basement was quiet most of the time, sure, but it’s supposed to be quiet. It’s a basement. It makes sense. This is a house. A normal house. There’s carpet and cupboards and a thermostat on the wall. It isn’t supposed to be silent, but something in Jack can’t bear to disturb it. He tiptoes down the hallway and pauses at the end of it, peering into the living room.

It is trashed. The TV is shattered, glass strewn on the carpet. The couch and chair are upended, one of the legs broken in two.

That was what Mr. Reeder was doing? Ruining his house before he offed himself? Who does that?

“Psychos, Jack,” he says aloud. “Psychos.”

Something on the other side of the room catches his eye.

A landline.

Jack watches where he’s going, carefully avoiding the glass and splintered wood, rushing to the phone. He holds it to his ear and dials 911 with shaking hands, listening closely.

He waits, five, ten, thirty seconds. He hangs up and dials again. There’s not even a dial tone. Jack smashes the phone against the wall and lets it hang.

“Dammit!” The sound is hollowly absorbed against the walls. Everything echoes so much down in his cell that it’s slightly off-putting. But he needs to think.

Mr. Reeder probably has a cell phone, but Jack is not going back in that room. A shudder runs through him even thinking about it.

He cautiously walks through the kitchen, stepping over the overturned kitchen table and chairs, to a back door. The musty smell of a garage washes over him, and he rushes for the car. It’s a junker from the 90s, paint and rust aging it. His hands shake reaching for the doorhandle, pulling it open with a piercing squeak from the door hinges. The keys are still in the ignition, thank the freakin’ heavens. The engine sputters when Jack turns them. He tries again, stepping on the gas.

The car doesn’t move. His eyes track along the dash and he just manages to spot the LOW FUEL flashing light next to the arrow sitting past the E before he smashes his head against the steering wheel. How did Mr. Reeder even get home?! Did he ride in on fumes? It’s a miracle he got in the freakin’ garage!

Jack sighs, putting his head in his hands. He has no choice. He has to go looking for someone.

Mr. Reeder’s house is a solid five miles away from anyone and anything, Jack knows. Mr. Reeder has made it very clear over the years that no one would ever hear his screaming, and no one would ever know where he is.

He had no idea that he would somehow be even more alone only a couple years later.

The only car Jack ever heard coming down the road was Mr. Reeder’s own. No one passed or drove through, so he is most likely going to have to make the whole five mile hike to get help.

He looks doubtfully down at himself. A roughly twenty year old man wearing dirty sweatpants and a shirt with holes torn along the hem, not to mention the blood stains. No shoes. A detrimental limp, only eight fingers, one and a half ears, scars galore … He’s certainly a sight to behold.

At least no one will doubt his legitimacy. But it is going to be a, for lack of a better word, sucky walk.

His heart aches a bit as he thinks that a five mile walk would’ve been no issue for him before.

“Knock it off,” he says aloud. “That doesn’t help anything.”

First, Jack needs shoes. Looking near the front door he sees a small collection of shoes, old and dirt covered. He picks out a pair of brown New Balances that surely used to be white and slips them on. No socks and shoes a size too big will leave him wicked blisters but he can’t find it in himself to care at the moment.

It’s hot in the house, and Jack assumes it is outside too, but he takes a jacket hanging from a hook anyway. It feels the tiniest bit blasphemous in a way to wear the clothes of a dead man. But what’s he gonna do? He’s dead and he sucked when he was alive.

Lastly, he finds a water bottle in the kitchen and fills it—twice because he drank all of it in one go the first time.

Jack is psyching himself up for the walk when he realizes he left something downstairs in the basement. In his cell. He groans, making his way to the staircase. The lights are still on, illuminating the plain wooden boards. It doesn’t feel right. It’s such a nightmare of a place, it should be shrouded in darkness like in a horror movie. It looks like a normal unfinished basement from the top of the stairs.

“The sooner you go the sooner you can leave forever. Just go.” So with one hand tightly wrapped around the banister, Jack descends back into hell.

It’s jarring, how different the basement is from what a regular person would expect. The raw wood of the last step is stained brown and burgundy from Jack’s own blood. Hooks hang from the ceiling with chains, ropes are wrapped around a dining table chair. A collection of freak stuff like handcuffs, whips, and stun guns are tossed on a table, dropped recklessly by Mr. Reeder after they had served their purpose. His cell is just a room in the corner with a small bathroom attached.

Jack doesn’t give the makeshift dungeon a glance, eyes trained on the floor. He beelines for the cot pushed in the corner, on which he was sitting bored out of his mind only a few minutes ago. It already feels like forever.

He reaches under the thin mattress and into a small tear he’d made. Inside, among the weird mattress stuffing, is a small piece of paper. He grips it protectively, slipping it into his jacket pocket.

He runs up the stairs faster than he cares to admit, stopping to catch his breath at the top.

Jack childishly flips the basement off one last time.

The front door is white, with brass hardware. It has no window. There are scuff marks on the bottom, and dirty finger prints on the paint near the handle. Jack takes a deep breath and notices this all again.

He knows he’s stalling. He even knows why he’s stalling. It’s like … when you’re reading a book that is breaking your heart but it still hurts to finish it and leave it in the past. Like when Jack’s dad died and all he wanted to do was leave the funeral, but when it was time to go home he couldn’t. His grandma had to basically carry him out of the cemetery, and as soon as they stepped outside Jack knew something had ended, despite how young he was.

But that’s stupid. That’s stupid here, it’s dumb. He was tortured here. He was starved and beat and filmed and dehumanized in every way possible. What the hell would he be missing?

Stability. Knowing what each day entailed. Anonymity. When you step out that door, everyone will know. Mom will know. Strangers will know. Everyone will know your pain.

It’s petrifying, having to share your pain. Most people won’t be gentle with it.

Something compels Jack to take one last look at the living room, and a calendar on the wall catches his eye. Nothing about the photograph of the beautiful landscape in a foreign country. It’s the date that makes Jack finally turn the handle.

Orange light washes over him. He closes his eyes and turns his head up to the rays. It soaks into his skin, warming a part of him that had long gone cold. It’s invigorating, life giving. Jack has never felt anything like it before.

It’s been six years since he’s seen the sun.

—

Five miles is really freakin’ long when you’re severely malnourished and have a bum leg, Jack figures out pretty quickly. He frequently needs to stop and breathe, leaning against trees lining the long road away from Mr. Reeder’s.

Every sound has him looking down the road, ready to flag down a car and ask to be taken to the police station.

What was he even going to say?

Hi, I don’t know if you know me but I’m Jack Thatcher, I was kidnapped a whopping six years ago and held by a lunatic in his basement and tortured—he’d probably leave that part out—can I borrow your phone to call my mom?

The more he thinks about it the more he’s embarrassed to admit to someone he was kidnapped. No one else he knows was kidnapped. He wasn’t even good enough to be held for ransom, just sold off like cattle.

Jack stops in the road and takes another drink, holding the rapidly warming water bottle to his brow. The sun is beating on Jack in a way he didn’t expect, since it seems to be sunset. It’s not getting any cooler though. It’s been hot this whole time. Mr. Reeder’s basement was always relatively cold, the chill seeping deep into his bones in what he assumed were the winter months, making him shake til his limbs hurt.

Walking in the shade of the trees would probably be a better idea, but Jack needs to stay on the road where cars will see him.

It is enticing though, the idea of shade. He’s entirely unused to this type of heat. The last time would have been—well just about six years ago…

#endless dusk

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